Preparing for the Emotional Shift of Retirement

Depending on how you feel about your work, moving towards retirement can feel like a loss. It's certainly a big transition for most people, and especially so if you liked your work and enjoyed the people you worked with. It's important to consider what you will be retiring to do in the years ahead. I've heard it suggested that we should REFIRE rather than retire.

I'm working in life coaching with people who are coming up on the retirement transition, and planning for their next chapter of life. Here are some factors you may want to consider when you begin planning yours:

1. Figure out how you are going to stay active and keep moving. We know people age better if they keep active, so figuring out how you can safely get your 10,000 steps a day is key. Can you walk where you live? Swim? Go to a gym or exercise class regularly?

2. How are you going to contribute to others? Can you continue some volunteer work you have done earlier in your life? Do you have some ideas about how you could help a cause you care about, like seniors, animals, the environment, people with disabilities, children and youth, church, politics, hospitals, or something else? If you are not sure and need ideas, google your local volunteer center. In Orange County, California, where I have my counseling practice, we have a great organization called One OC that has a job bank for both board positions and direct service volunteer positions from non-profits all across the county (www.oneoc.org).

Think about whether you want to use the same skills you've used at work, or have a chance to do something different. Would you like to work on projects alone and independently, or work with people? Volunteer work is a source of meaning and contribution. It's also a great venue for making new friends with great people with whom you share some common values with.

3. Keep learning new things. Upgrade your computer skills, take a class at the community college, look for opportunities with your local city community services, work crossword puzzles and otherwise challenge your brain to stay engaged. I like to encourage being a lifelong learner, so look for activities that will keep you learning and thinking. Would you like to join a film society, book club, or check your local university for continuing learning opportunities for seniors? Many retirees find new groups to learn with or do activities with on meetup.com. In Orange County, Cal State University, Fullerton has the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) with wonderful classes for retired and almost retired adults. You can contact them by phone or email, (olli-info@fullerton.edu, or 657-278-24460).

4. Keep up your people contact daily. Don't get isolated. Figure out how you can set a goal of being in contact with four or more people each day for maximum wellness. In the 1980's, the California Department of Mental Health did a campaign called, "Friends Can Be Good Medicine" about the mental and physical health benefits to being in relationships with others. It's still true. Put it into practice in your retirement, when you will need to reach out more to others than you did before.

5. Consider working part-time or reducing your hours gradually to ease the transition.

6. Consciously add new friends to your group.

7. Make sure to do at least an outing every day. Don't become a recluse.

8. If you are married or partnered, you will need time together, but you will be happier if you maintain some separate activities. You may be retired, but you still need some autonomy and different interests to keep things fresh. You don't want to suffocate each other. I've heard this called "retired to have dinner together, but not always lunch". You will have more to share with each other if you each pursue some of your own things. Everyone needs a separate sense of self.

9. If you are already, or become a grandparent during your retirement, that's another incredible opportunity for reaching out, transcending self, and creating meaning. Wouldn't it be meaningful to make the grandparenting role an important one? You may have skills to teach or be more available or patient than the children's parents who are at a busy stage in their lives. Making positive memories with your grandchildren is an incredible legacy. I know my girls will never forget Gram teaching them to make homemade pasta and bake pies, or Gramps teaching them to drive and garden.

10. Cultivate flexibility. There are losses that occur as we age, with our own aging process and with our partners. Try to develop an ability to adjust gracefully when it's time, knowing that the changes will continue.

If you begin thinking creatively, your retirement years could be some of your very best ones. People are living longer, so recreating your life after the working years is a whole new chapter to choreograph and build health, connection, learning and contribution. Now that's a life well lived. Let's think not just about retiring from, but retiring to.

Pursuing Happiness

Each person has a set point for happiness. It is impacted by genetics, family and life experiences. Your happiness level is also greatly influenced by daily thoughts and behaviors, perhaps even more profoundly than any other influence. What you think about, and what you choose to do each day makes a big difference in both your own life and every life you touch.

Positive psychology is a field of inquiry that began to be identified in 1998 by University of Pennsylvania psychology professor, writer and researcher Martin Seligman. He's the author of Authentic Happiness and Learned Optimism. It is based on the idea that psychology shouldn't just focus on mental illness and pathology, but also lead in the pursuit and understanding of what helps people create meaning, contentment, joy, resiliency and wellness.

Shawn Achor, M.A. is a Harvard scholar, educator, business consultant and writer who has spent over 12 years studying what makes people happy. His TED talk about happiness is one of their 20 most viewed lessons. He is a big advocate of positive psychology, and wrote The Happiness Advantage. Achor is interested in how happiness improves work success.

It's not like people who are happy don't feel unhappiness. They do, and it's important. Sometimes unhappiness is a key indicator that you need to change something in your life. You may need to assert yourself more, change jobs, or upgrade or end a relationship that's not working well. The opposite of happiness is actually apathy, when one doesn't care and doesn't believe what you do matters. Positive psychology strives to help people see that what they think, feel, and do does matter a great deal.

Here are some positive psychology strategies for feeling happier:

1. Each day, identify 3 different things you are grateful for. It helps build appreciation.

2. Send a thank you email, note, or give an in person thank you every day. It helps build connection.

3. Reflect each day, and either visualize or write down a little about one meaningful experience you have had recently. Rerun the experience through your mind as if it was happening now.

4. Still your mind for 20 minutes a day. Sit quietly. No distractions. Usher thoughts out as they pop up.

5. Move every day for at least 30 minutes.

6. Notice emotional pain and address it; don't numb it with alcohol, substances or addictive behavior.

7. Reach out to others. Say 'hi" and smile to others you meet throughout the day. Break the self-absorption cycle that many people are caught in.

8. Help someone else, whether officially through volunteering or informally when you are aware of other people's needs and do what you can to lift others up.

Your thoughts, feelings and behaviors matter. Connecting with others and staying focused on your own true north helps. Think of these happiness habits as happiness hygiene. Just like you shower and brush your teeth daily, these behaviors are most effective in lifting your mood if you do them every day. Let's be intentional about doing the things that make us happier and more aware of our impact on each other.

Something to Look Forward To

We all need something to look forward to. Do you remember being a child, and the amazing feeling of anticipation and excitement you may have felt as summer got closer?

What are you currently looking forward to in your life? If you don't have something you are excited about coming up, maybe it's time to set a goal and make some plans.

Mental health and wellness depend upon having some hope, making plans, and working towards making your dreams happen. Whatever your budget, having a day trip, or a weekend away planned, or beginning to save for and research a trip a year or more in the future, helps you not to get stale or bored. There is something about the planning and anticipation that is good for our outlook. This forward action shows that you are taking responsibility for keeping yourself interesting and curious about life.

Everyday life can get repetitive and a bit boring unless we soul search and introspect on what some healthy goals might be for checking experiences off our bucket list, make plans to reconnect with people who matter, and find ways to challenge ourselves.

Perhaps you have always been curious about traveling to a foreign destination, or want to go back to school, change your career, try dating again, or set some other personal goals to develop yourself and keep your self growing and fully alive.

Many life changes, like overcoming a loss like divorce or a death of a parent, can become opportunities to reinvent yourself and grow some more. Some people dread the children leaving home, or impending retirement, when these can be chances to explore new aspects of yourself that you have not had a chance to develop. Even as we age, we need to keep setting goals and growing.

There is something exceedingly healthy about setting some plans and working to make them happen.
Setting your intention can be very powerful, and help you manifest some of your fondest wishes into happening. What are you excited about in your life? What are you looking forward to in the next few weeks and months? If you can't think of anything, that's the perfect time to begin planning an adventure or a goal you can get excited about. You'll be glad you did.

The Eight Habits of Love

We all have our daily habits: what we eat for breakfast or lunch, the route we drive to work, what programs we watch on television, and a thousand other little repeated patterns. What if we cultivated emotional and spiritual habits that made our lives warmer, bigger, and more transcendent?

In Ed Bacon's new book, The Eight Habits of Love: Open Your Heart, Open Your Mind (Hachette Book Group, 2012) he gives illumination and insight about how we can grow these emotional habits in our day to day lives. Ed Bacon serves as rector at All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena, California, and is known for his radically inclusive views about building interfaith community between Christians, Jews, Muslims, and atheists. Ed has received awards his peace and interfaith work in Southern California.

What are the 8 habits of love?

1.      The habit of generosity: Overcoming fear to live daily with the spiritual practice of an open and generous heart. This means knowing that love flows through you, generously, to others. This includes not only giving money to less fortunate people, but also time, emotional and spiritual support, and encouragement. You can make a practice of lifting others up. Giving time and attention to others only enhances your own life.

2.      The habit of stillness: Learn to quiet your body and your mind. This quiet space within us is where we plan, get inspiration, strategize, dream, and self-nurture. There are many roads to this inner stillness. Look for yours. You might start with 10 minutes a day.

3.      The habit of truth: This involves developing the courage to go against what is expected of you by others at times. Choosing your truth, rather than self-deception or the deception of others, takes daily practice. Telling the truth is both frightening and refreshing. Bacon says, “Truth leads us to a more honest and vital life.”

4.      The habit of candor: Using both tenderness and tact, candor helps us have difficult and important conversations with those we care about. We don't avoid in fear; we move towards the other person in love and candor. The habit of candor is one of the hardest habits to practice, because it involves risk. Candor is not a power grab. I notice the healing, transcendent power of honest, candid, heart-centered conversations in my counseling office on a regular basis. Couples often do not say the things they need to be saying to each other. When those difficult conversations begin in a safe way, transformation can begin between two people.

5.      The habit of play: Bacon reminds us that play and laughter change our brain chemistry. Play activates our imagination, creativity, and joy. Spending time with a child always helps me remember how vital play is. It relaxes and refreshes us. Play and lightness renew us, and are the perfect foil for dealing with life's challenges. Bacon suggests when you have made an error, acknowledge it with humor, poking fun at yourself. Invite play into your work, the things you do at home, your time with your partner, your family, and your friends.

6.      The habit of forgiveness: When you can, forgiving someone who has wronged you releases a powerful, loving energy. When we hold onto wrongs, we hold tension, anger, resentment, and hurt. You don't even have to reconnect with the person that hurt you in order to forgive. Forgiveness brings self-healing and self-empowerment. In his book, Bacon tells a heart-warming story about Nelson Mandela establishing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa after the end of apartheid. Those who acknowledged guilt to those they harmed weren't punished. Forgiveness, and moving past blame, moves individuals, families, and communities forward towards healing.

7.      The habit of compassion: Most religions are founded on it. The challenge is in trying to stretch the edges of your compassion to all living beings. Try not to dehumanize any group of people. In categorizing others, Bacon suggests, we cut ourselves off from the foundation of our own humanity. If you did not receive compassion growing up in your family, you may need to look outside the family to experience the compassion for yourself and others that is your birthright.

8.      The habit of community: It's not good for us to get too isolated. A shift in our awareness can help us realize that we need each other. Connecting with the people whose lives intersect with ours is practicing building community. Look for your community. Developing a sense of belonging in community is good for our mental and physical health. Whether you apply community by interacting kindly with counter staff or others you see at the gym, at work, or next door, or look for a group of like-minded people in the larger community, it makes a difference, both for you and for others. Respecting differences within the community is essential.

The Eight Habits of Love is a thoughtfully written reflection on ways to begin moving forward in your life in an open-hearted way. We will make mistakes, but stretching ourselves to live with a more generous spirit, playfulness, bravery, honesty, compassion, forgiveness, and community will help us to make our lives well-lived. Now that's success.